Some claim Darwin’s theory of evolution is outrageous; others that it’s among the greatest ideas inscientific history. What anxieties are its controversies charged with? What strategies of rhetoricdoes Darwin’s prose deploy? What changes if we read it as literary fiction? We will explore suchquestions by studying Darwin’s The Origin of Species (1859) in the context of nineteenth-centuryBritish imperialism, and trace its possible resonances with later texts on the human-inhumanthreshold, such as Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1899), D.H Lawrence’s The PlumedSerpent (1926), Edward Wilson’s The Diversity of Life (1992) and Mahashweta Devi’s ‘Pterodactyl, Puran Sahay and Pirtha’ (1995). We will review debates on evolution’s tensions with religious beliefs, note the theory’s feeding of fascist and racist dogma – but also admire, hopefully, its illumination of the natural world in the depths of time. Around these materials, in an inclusive workshop-setting, we will fashion our own acts of critical thinking, speaking, listening, interpretation and conversation.